I’ve officially left my 20’s.  Entering into a new decade hasn’t felt earth shatteringly different.  Although, there have been marks of celebrations that felt extravagant and God answered one of the desires of my heart — to have a birthday surprise.  I had birthday surprise(s), plural.  My friends and family outdid themselves.  My words fall short in telling them what their love has done for me (expanded my heart in ways and depths I didn’t ever know prior).  There’s already this sense of feeling comfortable in my own skin setting in, and I like it! I’m excited for what the year has in store. Some traditions I realized, I unintentionally started — birthday bagel (had one in the airport, flying home from a wedding up north the morning of my birthday), flying home on my birthday (flew home from NYC three years ago on my birthday). This celebration into 30 felt unrecognizably cool, and not cool in the teenage vernacular way but as in cool, calm and collected. I believe it’s because I had very little expectation.  I’ve come to place where all I have is enough. Jesus has satisfied my every need, my desperation to find meaning and purpose and happiness, found in life in Him. Everything given on top of that is bonus. 

But to say that without saying the next part would sound very “churchy” and irrelevant because guess what? My heart still has some work to be done. I know that statement to be true and I feel that most days, but the temptation to get more, be more, do more is still something Him and I work at, day by day. I wish I could say what I said about this birthday about every birthday, but that wouldn’t be true. My heart has had many extraction surgeries over the last few years — taking hard edges and replacing it with soft corners and a malleable, surrendered spirit, all gently massaged in by the work of the Holy Spirit. 

My last year, 29, had a lot of elements attached to it that I see as God continuing to break things down in me that still needed breaking down — the uglies that are hard to own, things like selfishness, entitlement with a sprinkle of heightened, unrealistic expectation.  He’s been breaking these down for quite some time. Thank You Jesus! There were some hard cries this last year because I want what’s next but that’s not what He wants to give me yet. I have something more to learn here first. And I realized one morning, if I’m not careful I’ll miss the blessings this season has to give and I don’t want to look back and remember any temper tantrum. I want a heart that smiles at all that’s given and God gave me just that as my 30th birthday gift.

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From a young age, I was always lavished with gifts.  I was never without, I was always “handed” things.  We all want to lavish our children or parents or friends with things to tell them “I love you” and are constantly prodded to do more, spend more, give more. But it isn’t always the material gifts that matter most.  Years of excess can cause a callousness to the “special” and the things intended to bless lose their awe factor and disappointment shows up because this year’s didn’t beat last year’s.  I believe I became complacent and the air of entitlement settled in throughout my early years.  I see this “entitlement” as an American culture phenomenon.  There is a belief we deserve more and better.  Go to any birthday party and there is usually stacks and stacks of gifts.  While gifts are lovely gestures, the overabundance of anything flirts dangerously with the line of growing discontentment when ‘more’ is never enough.  There’s been years riddled with unhappiness at the wrong gift or the unmet expectation that I was always hoping for more.  It’s hard to admit, but it’s honest.  I think of the movie Spanglish, where Flor, the main character, raises her daughter in such a way that’s protecting her from this consumerism / materialism culture we live in.  I love the way she handles the situations that arise in her daughter’s life and she knows when to pull the plug and say, “Enough is enough”.  Well, in some ways I feel there were many moments where God said, “Enough is enough” in the last couple of years.  Not to be mean but loving because it was what I needed and what would water the seed of contentment in my heart.  There is contentment to be found and a joy on the other side of all the “things” we are told to consume to make us happy.  ‘More’ is counterfeit happiness and consuming more and collecting endlessly can be unhealthy if we’re not careful to keep track of our heart.  Like my pastor says, “the heart of the problem, is the problem of the heart.” 

bloom, where you’re planted

I felt as if the second part to my 20’s were filled with collecting memories and I was given beautiful opportunities to see parts of this world I never imagined.  That was a gift because it was unexpected.  God provided the people, places and finances to do all that I did in my mid twenties (24-25).  There was a definite shift in how I traveled come year 26 or 27, and I felt if it wasn’t tied to work, I needed to reevaluate why I was going and was it something I was taking and make happen over it truly being a gift and a blessing?  I didn’t want a sense of jadedness to rob me of one of the things I love most in this life — seeing new places — because I was being a spoiled child and taking advantage of my Father’s generosity. 

Year 29 was marked by a list I kept, “All the things I wanted to say yes to but instead said no to”, and I watched what I was able to fill my calendar with in place of the desired “yes”.  Most of the opportunities regarded travel.  But I felt a strong sense of testing to remain firmly planted at home for a time, to be responsible with the business I’d been given and to save money, choosing the responsible over the “fly on a whim” pattern I’d grown accustomed to.  Traveling is not a bad thing, again this was more of a heart thing for me.  And to be given what I’ve been asking for on a larger scale, perhaps I needed to cut back on a smaller scale to allow room for more inner growth and maturity to work its way in.  It was fun to experience what I wouldn’t have been able to experience at home had I chosen to say “yes” to some of those bigger experiences.  And it definitely allowed room for contentment to really take root.  I thought last year I was beginning to feel contentment have its way, but I think that was only the beginning.  This year, I was content to stay home and give up the trip of a lifetime — an opportunity to go to Africa and London, two of the biggest things on my list of places to see — and traded it in for a two week commitment to Vacation Bible School, where I thoroughly felt such unencumbered joy and peace and the blessing of teamwork — an unexpected blessing.  Not to say, the African/English adventure wouldn’t have fostered the same sense of joy, but perhaps to recognize contentment more fully, it had to be given in a more routine way to really showcase itself.  It’s expected to have a larger than life opportunity bring your senses to life, but it was a testament to God’s faithfulness to obedience to have my senses awakened by the smaller thing.  It breaks the measuring system of what’s greater and it’s freeing to experience fullness of joy without having to go to such extreme lengths.  I needed this and it is to be set as a stone of remembrance in my life.  To have the smaller, less extravagant thing is what my heart needed to work through and accept to finding joy, peace, excitement, contentment — in these things too. 

into the beautiful unknown

There was also a brief thought of a trip to India, but would my business suffer if I was off the grid half of May?  Most definitely.  It needed my full attention.  And I was able to finish my 5th year of Virtue Women’s Bible Study well.  When I say “yes” to something, there is less of me to give to the commitments I’ve already made.  Speaking of commitments, our women’s bible study was something used to stretch me in the art of committing.  It’s been five (5) wonderful, glory filled years being in this study.  Friendships have blossomed, the fruit is budding off the Virtue tree in my life.  But as I prayed about what to commit to this coming year, I felt a call out of ministry in this capacity.  I made the hard decision to say “no” to another year of leadership and the study, and I’m expectant (not in the spoiled child way, but in the what does God have up His sleeve way) as to what God has for me and what He’ll fill that space with.  However, those girls and Thursday night’s were some of my most cherished memories of the last five years (24-29) and it’ll be a change but one I’m ready for.

weddings + the marriage project

I really have it on my heart to fully invest into writing.  I’ve been lovingly encouraged by my Virtue girls to press into that and to remain steadfast to that calling.  To have their support and prayers means the world.  I’m 43,000 words into writing my first ever book, named after the current project I’m working on called The Marriage Project — which has moved forward and is in a place of readying to launch. A launch party, events and a book release for year 30? Also, I realize coming from someone unmarried, this title may sound odd but it will all make sense once it’s released.  And I don’t want to stop there. I’m praying for even more books and roads to be paved for that in my life. Even as I type now, my fingers feel at home and a sense of pressure is released as I get the words from my mind onto this blank white page.  A muscle exercised.  I’m not sure what will be next for writing… publishing said book? Which seems daunting and impossible…but with God, I know nothing is. And it’s a “run towards the fear” moment, more of those please because on the other side of fear is freedom and increased faith!

On the photography front, something I did to close out 29 was learn how to LOAD film  — not quite shooting film on a film camera yet but learning and observing from a film photographer was a highlight that fit right into the end of the twenties.  Here’s to 30 and investing in a film camera? And here’s to more weddings and amazing clients for 2019.  

fullness

In all, I feel as if this year, year 29, was one I’m still not quite sure of.  I’m wracking my brain to process the purpose for it all, and I come back to the place of delighting fully in the unexpectedness of the blessings that filled the dots on my calendar.  There were pockets that were filled with emotional highs and lows, places where anxiety threatened to come in and take control once more but where I found ‘peace’ through declaring who my God is and who I am in Him and that nothing can rob my identity found in Him.  And I found that even in suffering — as I’m still battling hives almost daily (have been for the last two and a half years) and crazy, debilitating headaches — God has remained my strength and He has held me and helped me through it all. It is all a privilege and I’d rather suffer for doing good than suffer the consequences of sowing anything which is not building God’s Kingdom here, now.  

“For it is better, if it is God’s will, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil.” 1 Peter 3:18.  

I’ve found contentment to where God has me, a prayer and a word spoken from Him that’s finally showing up in my life.  Content to being single… I had a moment with God where I saw the future, I believe Him for the gift of marriage in my life and I felt Him invite me to soak up every last moment of ‘singleness’ and I was surprised when tears began falling. Me and singleness have become sweetly acquainted, and while I know the Lord and I are going to have new, sweet moments as He takes me on the journey of being married, it will be different and it was a moment of realizing I will be saying “farewell” to a dearly made “friend”…
…content to living at home and being in the same place for nearly three decades and not taking any part of this journey for granted. Embracing every moment and every relationship given, and seeing it all as a true gift.  The people who surrounded me this year to kick off year 30 were exactly the people God has been working into my life and their presence in my life has been received with such awe and wonderment at how good my Father is, clearly evidence to my heart softening to receive, not resist, such excessive love.  Each person, gifts, piled high — their hearts and words felt almost too much to bear because it is so extravagant.  Yet the difference in these gifts, they are so much more than any “thing” one can buy.  The “things” don’t matter anymore and the gift of togetherness and presence and quality time are far more valuable than any “thing”.  Jesus fills my heart and it’s as if He’s in there, with arms stretched out, causing room for more love to grow, more love to give and to receive.  

it starts with one

What I asked God for at the start of this faith journey was “one” — one steadfast friend to walk through this journey with.  I didn’t expect ‘more’…I honestly didn’t know what to expect.  And I believe that’s why He’s given more and more and more.  I didn’t demand any of this.  My entitled foot didn’t stomp but rather I asked a simple request. And He gave the one.  But then He gave another… and from those He’s continued to multiply and add on, because He is a God of multiplication and addition, not one of division or subtraction. 

“He is a God of multiplication and addition, not one of division or subtraction.”

The greatest gift is God’s unending grace and mercy on me, to gently offer me moments to change my heart, to work in contentment and drive out the ugly monster called ‘entitled’ or ‘you deserve’.  Instead, I’ve been given.  And that’s all I need.  He’s given what He’s always intended and He’s made me the person ready to receive it all in humility with a deep reverence and thanks. I praise God today for thirty years of patience on His part and thirty years of undeserved blessings and I thank Him for the ‘more’ and I say “sorry” for the countless times I didn’t return to say “thank You”. Where I expected ‘this… or this or that’ from Him and others.  But I’m so glad He didn’t give up on me and allowed me to find this place of deep rest and peace and contentment and put in my heart a joy so full — to expect nothing and in turn, receive everything.  I’ve been made rich — not just in “things” but in fullness of life in Christ. 

This is the verse God gave me on my birthday — 

“Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of feed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness.

You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God.

This service you perform is not only supplying the needs of God’s people but is also overflowing in many expressions of thanks to God.  

Because of this service by which you have proved yourselves, men will praise God for the obedience that accompanies your confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing them and with everyone else.  

And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, 

because of the surpassing grace God has given you.

Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift” 2 Corinthians 9:10-15